Beyoncé Demands Gender Equality in Her New Essay For The Shriver Report

We can’t think of anyone who’s a better example of girl power than Beyoncé — okay, except maybe the Spice Girls.

In fact, she believes in gender equality so much that she wrote an essay for Maria Shriver’s The Shriver Report, which contains research and essays on women’s struggle for equality in today’s society. In Beyoncé’s essay, “Gender Equality is a Myth!” she writes about how equal pay for women is directly tied to how much they are respected and calls for a change.

“Today, women make up half of the US workforce, but the average working woman earns only 77 percent of what the average working man makes,” Beyoncé writes. “But unless women and men both say this is unacceptable, things will not change.”

“Humanity requires both men and women, and we are equally important and need one another. So why are we viewed as less than equal?” she continues. “These old attitudes are drilled into us from the very beginning. We have to teach our boys the rules of equality and respect, so that as they grow up, gender equality becomes a natural way of life. And we have to teach our girls that they can reach as high as humanly possible.”

Beyoncé’s not the only one who contributed to The Striver Report. She’s in good company — Eva Longoria, Jennifer Garner, and Jada Pinkett Smith all contributed essays of their own, as well as Hillary Clinton.